Xbox User Blog

Evening, all! Word has been sent through the great Xbox 360 grapevine that Slick Entertainment’s racer Scrap Metal will touch down this week for a mere 1200 Microsoft Points. Well, mere by modern standards, anyway. The game itself is somewhat of an odd mix between Twisted Metal and, say, Micro Machines, challenging players to compete in armed vehcles for the title of top racer. A prestigious one indeed, that.

It’s out there, but what is Epic planning…

The likely hood that Gears Of War 3 is in the works with a possible release date of fall 2010, is just one of those things. We all know it’s probably coming, but Epic are keeping tight lipped (annoyingly). That said, Gears is a formulaic type of game and one we think we can probably second guess, so here we go, here’s the top three things we think we’ll see from Gears 3…

1. Flashbacks and a much more epic story

The Gears story is totally stupid but at the same time huge amounts of fun. That said, it’s constantly referencing past events or the conflict at large. Marcus’ father, why he was imprisoned, all perfect set pieces for some flashback action. The more comfortable Epic becomes with their own engine the more we’ll see.

2. The COG take the fight to the Locust heart

Gears 2 ended with a massive battle and some intriguing revelations (are the Locust a human creation?). With it all kicking off and very few human cities remaining the COG will have to take the fight straight into the heart of the Locust home or risk losing the battle for good.

3. Movie tie-in?

The movie maybe in production limbo but that doesn’t mean someone’s not working away at it. With Epic in a strong position we could see Gears 3 used as a way of leading into the events of the film. This is more of a long shot, but who knows?

What do you think we’ll see from Gears Of War 3? Let us know what you think below…

Who needs a PC when Crytek can get Crysis 2 running on your 360!

Obviously, these screens won’t literally blow you away, that would be stupid, but they do look mighty impressive. The much anticipated Crysis 2, now for consoles, is finally starting to look like it might, just possibly, actually be able to work on the clearly inferior 360 technology. Not that were dismissing our beloved Xbox or anything, but compared to the ridiculous PC rigs required to run the original Crysis, it’s nothing short of a miracle that Crytek has managed to create a sequel that looks just as impressive as ever.

Crytek has released these two shiny new screens to prove that Crysis 2 is going to totally blow you away when it’s released. But will the gameplay match up to the impressive visuals?

What do you think about Crysis 2? Let us know your thoughts below…

No, he’s nothing like the Master Chief…

The  first batch of screenshots of Platinum Game’s promising looking sci-fi third person shooter have begun to emerge and it’s looking as curious as ever. With it’s transforming suit and at war super powers (Russia and America, again!) fighting other resources it could be argued that it’s lacking in the originality departments. But, there’s just something about these shots that says stomping around in this suit is going to be awesome fun.

What’s the general consensus? Let us know what you think below…

Good bye Tomb Raider and hello Lara Croft… again

Square Enix came out today and announced that Crystal Dynamics, long running saviours of the Tomb Raider games, is working on a new title. The ‘hinting at a reboot’ Lara Croft And The Guardian Of Light is going to be interesting for a few reasons. Firstly, because it’s a reboot of a much loved franchise and secondly because it won’t be a traditional release but will come as DLC only.

It hasn’t been revealed what platforms the game will be released but it’s safe to assume that the big two will definitely see it. Billed as ’something completely new to what people may expect’, Lara Croft could be making a triumphant return to form in a brave new way.

What do you think? Are you ready for another Lara Croft game that’s not Tomb Raider? Let us know below…

Excited about upcoming FPS Metro 2033, from Ukrainian developer 4A Games? Me too! It’s based on the book of the same name – and tonight, there’s an opportunity to ask the author behind it all, Dmitry Glukhovsky, a few questions about the alternate history thriller.

Glukhovsky will be on Twitter and Facebook tonight, from 21.00-23.00PM GMT. For Twitter, tweet @Metro2033 with your question during these times and add #Metro2033 to the end of your tweet. Facebook users can head to Facebook.com/Metro2033, become a fan of the page, then post in the relevant comments thread when the page is updated this evening.

See you on there! I’m going to ask him if he feels anything was lost in the translation process from Russian to English, as the story is released here for the first time this year. Metro 2033 is out in March – Lynch is playing it right now. Looks different to anything else on 360, especially in terms of atmosphere.

The curse of the movie licence… wwhhooo, spooky

Let’s face it, movie licenced games tend to suck. There may have been a time when we all looked forward to the latest Spider-man game, but now, who are we kidding, now we generally couldn’t care less.

That’s why we spoke to Clash Of The Titans producer, Tomoaki Nanjo about the difficulties of developing games based on movies…

“I believe there are 3 major points we need to look into on this topic.

1 – Lack of development period

In most cases, developers cannot get their hands on the reference assets from the film makers at the ideal time which results in cutting back the development period especially when trying to release the videogame at the same time as the film.

2 – Negative trends in the past

The majority of the players won’t even touch a film based videogames due to the trend which existed in the past of film based titles not being up to scratch when released. As we see from the recent film based titles the quality is much higher nowadays.

3 – Limited market

Film based titles are strongly associated with the film which does tend to limit the size of the market and the audience available to reach for to a certain extent.”

Recently, I chatted to Capcom’s Shinsaku Ohara and Blue Castle Games’ Rob Barrett about the upcoming sequel Dead Rising 2. We got onto the subject of Japanese publishers working with Western developers, and the often damp results of such relationships – Dead Rising 2 won’t struggle in the same way, apparently. Here’s why.

“I think it’s how you do it,” Ohara says. “I know there are some Japanese publishers that just hire a Western developer to make a game and don’t have any involvement. With Dead Rising 2, there’s an effort on [both sides] to make this very much a Capcom game.”

Barrett continues. “We’re definitely Capcom fans, so some of the feedback we’ve been getting through focus tests or just internally, sometimes the feedback directly says ‘this feels like a Capcom game’, and that’s a huge compliment to us.”

Dead Rising 2 will be out here on September 3rd, with exclusive DLC released on Xbox Live to bridge the first two games together.

I feel the need, the need for… no, wait, that’s the other one

Are you excited about Blur? Do you want to play and or read about Blur? We’ll you’ll never guess what’s happened! It’s only our sister site NowGamer who’ve gone and got their grubby little hands on some Blur beta codes and had some extended hands on time with the latest build of the game. Not only are they giving away the codes but you can also read their impression of what is looking like an excting racer.

Follow this LINK here for the Beta codes

or

this LINK here for the exclusive preview. Enjoy!

I ain’t scared of no… Necromorphs?

Dead Space 2 may be a long way off but the original left us so traumatised we’re getting ourselves ready for the inevitable horror onslaught now. The first Dead Space managed to blend lots of sci-fi staple cliche’s and terror into a unique and horrible experience, but according to Ian Milham, Art Director on Dead Space 2, the sequel is moving away from the more obvious inspirations…

“Although we look at successful films to see what they’ve done, we really try to study the real world. For a horror story to work, the player really has to believe the world, so he or she can believe what happens there and not think it’s a fantasy. So we study what makes a world real believable and have a solid grounding. What makes an airport feel like an airport and not some other setting? What makes a room feel like a real room and not a bunch of polygons? Those are the questions we’re asking ourselves all the time.  We find that settings that are trying too hard to be scary frequently feel amateurish and heavy handed.  Real terror comes in the perversion of everyday spaces.”